Sheffield City Council is a major employer in the city with more than 18,000 employees, providing approximately 550 services to its citizens. In his role since 2013, Paul Green spoke to CIO UK last year about corporate transformation, shared services and digital public services. What is your job title?Director of Business Information and Transformation When did you start your current role?2013 Have you completed an MBA?No Order the following sources of advice/information by value to you:1. Peer group2. Analyist3. Consultant4. Vendors5. In-house Technology strategy and spending What is the major transformational IT project that has been recently completed, or is underway at your organisation?Customer First Programme (CFP) – E-Services Channel Shift and Migration Programme and Workplace Programme (Accomodation Strategy – reduction of 24 buildings to four, Organisational Change Programme, Technology enablement) What impact will it/does it have on the organisation?CFP wll provide single entry point for all customer service enquiries for all service provided by the council.Workplace Programme will save the council in the region £15m by reducing its property estate and by enabling more staff to work flexibly by adopting more effective working practices menaing more time with customers out in the field and less time having to pick up paper files from offices, etc. What new strategic technology deals has your organisation struck and with whom?PSN contract with Virgin Media Business in 2013 Name your strategic technology suppliers?We are outsourced (year 6 of 7-year contract with Capita) but we retain direct relationship with key strategic suppliers such as Microsoft, Civica, OLM and Kana Group. What is the IT budget?£12.5m for 2014-15 What is the strategic aim of the CIO and IT operations for the next financial year?To lead the councils future Digital Strategy and play a key role in the wider city Digital plan.To drive our "Better by Digital" organisation design principle to ensure all services are delivering services by means of digital as default but recognising which services still have to offer non-digital channels and consider how we support those in the city who are currently digitally excluded. IT availability will become even more critical as more services transform by means of Technology enablement. Transformation achievements Would you describe the CIO role as a transformation leader in your organisation?Yes, but in collaboration with Directors of Business Strategy who represent the Business. Successful Transformation relies on all parties prepared to work constructively with each other and innovate without boundaries or self interest. Describe the transformations you have led/been involved in, how did they transform operations, customer experience or the organisation?I current lead the Workplace Programme which started off as an Accomodation Strategy (Property Reduction Programme) but was soon recognised as a key organisation change programme. The 2-year programme finishes in March 2015 and we have so far transffered over1,000 people into our new largest single site and closed 6 of our major buildings. We have significantly reduced workspace by creating ratios 7:10 (7 desks for 10 staff) and created more drop in/touchdown spaces across the city to enable true mobile/flexibl working practices. Productivity has increased and the combination of service redesign enabled by new Technology and new digital skills has created a new and more modern working environment for our staff. Also leading the Digital Workspace Programme (Intranet replacement). Beyond technology, can you describe a business transformation programme that you own or contribute to?Customer First Programme – the first part of this programme to consolidate all front office services was the implementation of core Technology Infrastructure and the new CRM system. Working in partnership with the Director of Customer Services to identify services for migration into the new Customer First Programme and demonstrate the improvements and savings that would be made by bringing these services out of Directorates and into this single delivery model. Lots of resistance but progress being made. What key technologies are being considered to enable transformation?Mobile Strategy – Infrastructure and ApplicationsCloud – to offer more flexibility and cost reduction opportunities. Expect Cloud to improve timescales to implement business change programmes. Business Intelligence Applications What percentage of your applications / infrastructure is run from the Cloud?Private Cloud – 10%, Public Cloud – 0% currently but expect to migrate enterprise applications over next 2 years. How is the use by employees of their own technology, use of mobiles and social networking impacting operations, customer experiences or the organisation at present?Business Case for BYOD currently being developed including survey to staff asking them if they would want to use their own devices in the working environment and adhere to council policies to enable this.Minimum Digital Skills competency framework being established in 2014/15 to raise awareness of the benefits of Digital and Socal Media to all staff – expectatoin is this awareness will help them consider how services could be further improved with further exploitation of Social Media in the working environment and engagement with citizens and partners. Do you have a plan in place for how to deal with shadow IT and BYOD. How do you influence and engage executives, place the right controls around employee choice and engage with the organisation on this issue?We have a strong and robust governance in place to control  anyone attempting to bypass approved policies. The survey mentoned above will provide us with more insight as to where/if the current technology being offered is not supporting our staff meet their needs. Choice and flexibility is something we want to offer but as well as these any technology investmets to make this happen has to be factored in to ensure there is a business case that demonstrates adoption of BYOD has benefits to citizens, employees and the council. Information Security concerns still remain but should be recognised the risks are more around user negligence rather than technology Where do you seek transformational inspiration from?Thankfully there is a lot of interesting and innovative Transformation going on so strong peer networking and relevant association with key groups are essential to identify new opportunities that can be shared with business colleagues as business benefits they could consider. There is nothing more powerful than solid referencability from peers. Customer demand and engagement is also helping drive Transformation. In Sheffield we have developed a close relationship with the Sheffield Open Data Community who we meet on a monthly basis to determine their needs and what data they are requesting and what they are usng it for. Great opportunity to get their innovative thoughts on innovating with or data. The CIO role in the business Who do you report to?Executive Director of Resources Does the CIO have a seat on the board?Yes   How often do you meet with the CEO?Monthly Does your organisation have a digital leader and what is the difference in their responsibilities to yours?I have been designated the Digital Leadership role for the council What percentage of IT budget do you control and what percentage of IT budget does your digital peer hold?I control all of the IT revenue budget for the council. The IT department How many staff make up the IT team?(What is the split between in-house/outsourced staff)We are outsourced so have an internal client team of circa 20 staff. Capita have approx 100 – 120 staff. Describe the CIO’s management team, do you have direct reports that develop the relationship and services between the business and IT?I have the following Direct Reports:Head of Business Change and Programme DeliveryHead of IS Strategy and AssuranceHead of Information and Knowledge ManagementHead of Technology and Information SystemsWe have 3 Business Partners (who report to the Head of Business Change and Programme Delivery) each allocated to a Directorate to provide the link between the Business and the Business Change & IT Service And how many log-in accounts do you issue across you organisation?Circa 8,000 What is the primary technology platform? (for example ERP, Website, trading system)Microsoft Enterprise Platforms for Email, Sharepoint etc..Oracle Enterprise One (OeO) ERP, and a mix of line of business applications from multiple suppliers.